Synnefo + Ganeti = cloud software that works

I cannot comment on Synnefo itself, but Ganeti is a wonderful software. I have been using it for more than a year in production (June 2011) without a single issue. I even built my own PaaS on top of it[1].

If you want to understand the quality of Ganeti, go and take a look at an example of design document[2]. The quality of the documentation, the time spent in defining the requirements for the next release incorporating the feedback from the users together with the quality of the code and the human quality of the people at Google driving the project make it a pleasure to use this software.

If you are not interested, I anyway always recommend people reading the documentation of this project just to know that one can produce such good documentation.

[1]: http://notes.ceondo.com/mongrel2-zmq-paas/

[2]: http://docs.ganeti.org/ganeti/current/html/design-cpu-pinnin...

Front page should be clearer and it needs a bit more explanation, I first thought its cloud software for managing cloud and clients, but when I tried the trial option I didn't see any client options so that means its a software for managing own cloud vm's ? (but it has API, so it should be easy to build client interface) Also the "trial" option makes me think there is paid option somewhere, which is quite confusing since there isn't one, it should be replaced with "Demo" maybe ?

Being a user of Synnefo/"Cloud" (and the ~Okeanos/"Ocean") systems for a little while now, I have to comment with a simple "wow!". The amount and quality of engineering that has gone into the project, as well as the quality of the offered service is staggering. Most people involved in some manner in the academic software engineering community (be it Greek or not) are accustomed to receiving products that might on the one hand "work", within finely specified limits, but are otherwise classified as more or less involved hacks. Well, Synnefo both works like a charm and gives off an air of harmony (in the integration of the components and the eventual end-user experience).

Kudos everybody on a job well done. Can't wait for the service to go public.

NB: The whole project is build on commodity hardware with opensource solutions binding everything together. A whitepaper on its design and implementation, and case studies for use etc, would be certainly lovely to read.

So, how far exactly is the API compatible with Openstack? That's the one thing that would be really necessary to match. Basically, can I take tools and utilities that work with Openstack/keystone and have them working without any/much work? If you're able to do this it would be a nice, simple alternative to Openstack. For anyone installing Openstack for the first time, the install is anything but simple.

At the last LISA conference there was a talk by yours truly about Ganeti. It explains Ganeti assuming you don't have much virtualization experience:

https://www.usenix.org/conference/lisa12/ganeti-your-private...

This service is delightfully Greek. I haven't tried the actual offering, though. I think the front page copy could be a bit clearer, as I'm hazy on what exactly it does.